“I think that Mya died,” Marcus said. “And that Janus still thinks he can help her.”
There was a long, uncomfortable silence.
“That’s insane,” Cyte said.
“Is it?” Marcus said. “Do you know that for certain? I mean, I would have agreed with you two years ago. Since then I’ve seen dead bodies rise as monsters and watched a woman tear stone apart with her bare hands. Who am I to say that there’s no way to bring a girl back to life?” Look at Raesinia.
“But...” Cyte shook her head.
“He leaves Mieranhal. Reads everything he can find about magic, and figures out that if there is a demon that can do what he wants, it’s going to be at Elysium, with the Black Priests and their Penitents. He also finds out that the Thousand Names exist, so when he has the chance he gets the king to assign him to the Khandarai expedition.”
“Because he knows it’s a threat to the Black Priests,” Cyte said slowly. “So that there’ll be a war with Murnsk...”
“And he can march on Elysium with the army behind him.”
The sun was nearly gone from the sky. Up ahead, Marcus could see the lights of Gyff, warm and welcoming. The shadows of their horses stretched out, flickering along the road.
“You really think it’s possible?” Cyte said. “That he planned all of this?”
“I know that if anyone could have done it, it’s Janus bet Vhalnich.” Marcus shrugged uncomfortably. “But I think something’s gone wrong.”
“When he didn’t make it to Elysium, you mean.”
“More than that. If all this is true—?and that’s a big if—?then what’s the sense in what he’s doing now? Declaring himself emperor and marching south, toward Vordan, instead of back to Elysium?”
“Maybe he wants to secure Vordan before going back for another try. Or maybe there’s another step we don’t understand.” Cyte sighed. “Or maybe we’re spinning our wheels, and he’s just in love with power for its own sake.”
“It’s possible.” But Marcus remembered Janus on the march north, even before he’d been poisoned. The single-?minded focus. He was willing to sacrifice the whole army if it got him to Elysium. “Or maybe someone else is pulling the strings.”
“I don’t think Janus would ever serve as a puppet,” Cyte said.
“The Penitents got to him once,” Marcus said. “Maybe they did it again.”
Cyte gave Marcus a long look. “You want to believe that, don’t you?”
He did. He couldn’t deny it. Because if it’s true, then my betrayal isn’t a betrayal. We’re marching to save Janus, not to destroy him. “That doesn’t make it wrong.”
“It doesn’t.” She gave him a wan smile. “Just be careful. One of the lessons of history is that you should always be the most skeptical when the evidence lines up just the way you want it to.”
“We have that one at the War College, too,” Marcus said. “When things look too good to be true, it’s probably a trap.”
And if there’s one person who could set a trap like this, it’s Janus bet Vhalnich.
10
Winter
“Upstream,” Leti said decisively. “There’ll be a place to cross.”
“How do you know?” The Murnskai words still came slowly to Winter, but her vocabulary was improving, and she’d adapted to the peculiar dialect Leti and the others used. She needed Abraham to translate only when the conversation got particularly abstract.
“Deer tracks. They’ll have a way over.”
Leti pointed. They were standing by the side of a small river, running deep and fast in a narrow gorge. Trees overhung it on both sides, and bright green shoots were poking up through the sludge of plants killed by the sudden frost. There was nothing that looked like tracks to Winter’s eye, but she’d learned to trust Leti’s experience. The Trans-?Batariai—?they called themselves Haeta—?took for granted a level of wilderness expertise Winter couldn’t have matched in a lifetime.
“Come on.” Leti led the way upstream, bounding easily over the rocky ground. Winter followed, more cautiously, careful of her footing on the slime-?slicked stones. They scrambled up a short slope, while the river roared beside them. Sure enough, beyond a pair of massive boulders the water grew calmer, spreading out into a wide, shallow section that would be easy to ford.
Winter’s nose wrinkled at the smell of rotting meat, and she was immediately on guard. They hadn’t found any of the Beast’s bodies for days, but that certainly didn’t mean it had given up. Leti smelled it, too, and pointed to the piled debris that had jammed together between the two rocks. A deer’s head was visible, eyes gone and skull showing through gaps in the fur.
“Floods.” Leti shook her head. “This land went mad. We should never have come here.”
“You can say that again,” Winter said. The unnatural freeze and subsequent thaw had wreaked terrible havoc in the wild, and she could only guess how bad it had been for the people who lived here.
“I can?” Leti said, puzzled.
“Never mind.” Idioms were tricky when neither of them was speaking their native language. “We should find the others and tell them to come this way.”
“Yes.” Leti looked at the sun, which was well past the meridian. “We will camp on the other side.”
The Haeta traveled in one main group, where they traded off carrying the tents and other supplies, with pairs of scouts thrown out ahead and behind. Their pace was deceptive—?they didn’t seem to be rushing, but Winter often found herself hard-?pressed to keep up. Despite the speed of the column, Leti never had any trouble finding her way back to it, apparently possessing an intuitive map of the local terrain that Winter entirely lacked. As usual, Winter followed her lead, and soon they crested a ridge and found the bulk of their group. A pair of girls at the front, carrying their spears and without packs, waved to Leti and shouted something in their own language.
“Winter!” Alex jogged over. The girl was apparently none the worse for wear after her misadventure with the red-?eyes, and once again Winter sent up a silent prayer of thanks that Abraham had insisted on coming along.
“Hi, Alex. You keeping up?”
“More or less.” Alex shook her head and tugged at the straps on her pack. “I can see why they use those little tents. They seem a lot easier to carry.”
“Any sign of red-?eyes?”
“None of the rear guard have seen anything,” Alex said. “If they’re there, they’re staying well hidden.”
“They’re there. The Beast isn’t going to just give up, and we can’t hide our trail with this many people.”
“We’re moving pretty fast,” Alex said. “They may have trouble matching our pace.”
“We need to sleep,” Winter said grimly. “I’m not sure they do.”
The rear of the party came into view, the last few warriors also unburdened by packs and carrying spears. Abraham was among them, limping slightly. He’d replaced his broken walking stick, and after some discussion the contents of his pack had been distributed among the others, but he still trailed the rest of the group.